The Southern African Legal Assistance Network (SALAN) welcomes the stance taken by the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Chairperson President Patrick Mwanawasa’s call for the postponement of the Zimbabwean Presidential run-off elections scheduled for Friday 27th June 2008, which have been characterized by widespread violence, forcing MDC Presidential candidate Morgan Tsvangirai to announce his withdrawal from the race.

SALAN joins other human rights organisations in strongly condemning the unacceptable systematic campaign of violence, obstruction and intimidation led by the Zimbabwean State Agents and ZANU PF of President Mugabe. We call upon other SADC Heads of State in the region to join President Mwanawasa in not only condemning the violence but also standing up against President Mugabe to postpone the run off elections. 

The Grahamstown office of the Legal Resources Centre (LRC), on behalf of the Tergniet and Toekoms Action Group (TTAG) has filed an urgent application in the High Court asking for declaratory relief or in the alternative an interdict against Outeniqua Kreosootpale (Edms) Bpk (Outeniqua), the Chief of Air Pollution Control Officer (CAPCO) and others including the MEC for Environmental Affairs and Development Planning in the Western Cape and the Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism to stop Outeniqua from using tar processes to manufacture creosote on a site immediately adjacent to their neighborhoods.

The residents of the two communities have complained that emissions from the site cause them difficulties in breathing, tight chests, constant coughing, asthma, sinusitis, bronchitis, burnt and bleeding throats, stomach spasms, nausea and vomiting, blistering and peeling skin rashes, burning eyes and sensitivity to lights, headaches, dizzy spells, nosebleeds as well as cancer. They have also complained about their struggle to grow plants in the area and the unpleasant taste of food.

The Legal Resources Centre, lawyers for the Treatment Action Campaign welcomes the recent landmark judgment against German doctor Matthias Rath and the Government of South Africa.

This decision, which finally confronts the impact of alternative remedies on HIV positive South Africans, was handed down on 13 June 2008 by Judge Dumisani Zondi of the Cape High Court.

The High Court has finally confronted the impact of courtroom testimony on South Africa’s children.

This week the Pretoria High Court declared Section 170A(1) of the Criminal Procedure Act and several other subsections of the Act, which deal with children and the manner in which they are required to testify in court, unconstitutional.

The Western Cape government is to spend about R4,5-billion providing 110 000 homes and serviced sites over the next three years, says MEC for Local Government and Housing Richard Dyantyi.

This year his department's planned to launch and complete 30 housing projects in areas such as Blue Downs, Belhar and Steenberg, and provide about 12 000 houses and as many serviced sites in 27 townships regarded as vulnerable

A landmark High Court ruling against a multimillion-dollar prepaid water scheme in South Africa's largest township, Soweto, has been heralded as a global precedent in the struggle for the basic human right to water.
The City of Johannesburg is expected to appeal the judgement and residents realise that "the struggle will not end anytime soon". "Water is life, sanitation is dignity - this case is about the fundamental right to have access to sufficient water and the right to human dignity," said Judge Moroa Tsoka in the Johannesburg High Court last week.